Making our hearts sing

I do this kinda funny thing when I swim. I guess you could call it my trademark – or maybe just quirkiness. I hum the number of the lap I'm completing. I think of it as a goddess hum that puts positive energy into the water. I like to give something back for all it gives me. Also for the next person in my lane.

I've been doing it so long, I almost forget that I do. It's nothing anyone else could hear. I think it becomes meditative, even prayerful.

Today I began to wonder if it affects my breathing while swimming, possibly making it harder or me less efficient, so I tried about 8 laps without humming. Then, the swimming was pure work -- no joy, just effort. I could hear my air bubbles, but that was isolating and lonely. So I started humming and my heart began to sing again. This tells me I have made swimming a spiritual practice.

I may swim more efficiently, more easily without the humming, but what's the point if its joyless? Then I started to apply that concept to my whole person. I realized that even if life seems like more work to me at times, it's just who I am and what seems like more effort, may, indeed, be adding joy into my life and, possibly, the world.

And I hadn't even consciously understood that.

Maybe someday, I'll have the courage to hum or sing (a huge fear) out loud!


• What makes my heart sing?
• What happens if I stop?
• How conscious am I of how it affects me, the world?
• Have I been able to incorporate that into my life?


Onennnnnnnnnnnn
Twoooooooooooooo
Threeeeeeeeeeeeeee

almost begins to ring like ohm
in my throat, mouth, ears
and head

it makes my throat dry,
but my swim drier,
dull and lifeless
if I don't

helps curb my
restless mind,
connects it
to my body

and takes me to the
place where God
can touch me

where I can
and do open